Melodramatic Short Stories & Male POV Marriage Novels

I transmigrate into a melodramatic angst novel. My CEO wife, Victoria Gibson, hangs me up and beats me brutally to force me to agree to a divorce. But when I see the two-billion-dollar breakup fee, my eyes light up again and again. With both my hands injured, I quickly grab a pen with my foot and sign the divorce agreement. I say with a grin, "Thanks for the money. I wish you two a long and happy marriage. May you have many children."

I was supposed to marry Acara Grey today. Dressed in a suit, I stood all by myself at the end of the aisle for forty minutes, but she was nowhere to be seen. Both of my sisters were absent as well. They were not here because our younger foster brother, Levi Cal, had sent a picture in our group chat. It was an image of a scratch on his sports car. He told us he had gotten in an accident, and several drunk men had gotten out of their car and had him surrounded. They were hurling insults at him, and he was too terrified to step outside. Acara reached for the keys immediately and ran out to rescue him. My eldest sister, Nylah Thornton, immediately dispatched the company’s security team to the scene. My second sister, Mia Thornton, left in such a rush that she even forgot about the lapel pin she was supposed to put on me for the wedding ceremony. When I eventually called Acara to ask when she was coming, I heard the bustle of a restaurant in the background. As it turned out, only a bit of paint had been chipped off of Levi's sports car. The so-called drunken hooligans had left the scene a long time ago. The three ladies had taken him to a restaurant to help him get over the shock of what just happened. I suppressed my anger and reminded them that the wedding was about to begin. Acara replied in a completely candid manner, "So what if we're a little late? It's not going to ruin the wedding! Levi was nearly attacked in the parking lot. Can't you man up and be a little more understanding about it? Quit being jealous!"

I've just received a text from my CEO wife, Cara Lavigne. Apparently, she's gone on another last-minute business trip again, so she can't accompany me to the funeral home. But soon, I see Cara's silhouette being captured in a photo, where she celebrates her assistant, Warren Stone's birthday with him in a work-related post he has just uploaded. The caption reads, "Thank you for the amazing cake, boss! I feel so happy to be able to celebrate my birthday!" I just smile calmly before leaving a like and a comment. "Happy birthday." My colleagues, on the other hand, start betting pools like mad to see what kind of tricks I'm going to pull this time in order to kick up a ruckus. Cara calls me immediately just to scold me. "Warren is just celebrating his birthday, so what's with the comment? He's a very sensitive person, you know! How is he going to survive in this company now that you've passive-aggressively humiliated him in that public post? "It's been barely two years since Warren joined this company, not to mention he doesn't have any friends! What's wrong with me celebrating his birthday with him, huh? People like you, who are born with silver spoons in their mouths, will never understand Warren's plight! "I want you to delete your comment right now! We'll talk more about this once I'm home! Your dad is already dead anyway, so you can just wait for a few more days before claiming his body!" I can only clench my fists tightly as I listen to Cara's heartless and nonchalant words. "No need for that." Once she is back, the divorce procedures will be done.

It's the third year of our secret marriage, and there are still only three pairs of indoor slippers in the shoe cabinet—a pair for my wife, Renee Hickman, a pair for her friend, Penny Falcon, and a pair for her student, Aspen Frost. However, mine's not there. I look at the disposable indoor slippers Renee hands me and ask flatly, "Where are the cotton slippers that I bought?" She doesn't even look at me as she replies, "I threw them away before they came here." I reply with a grunt. Suppressing the bitterness rising in my chest, I ask casually, "Did Aspen come along this time too?" "No." She's lying. I know that because Aspen just sent me a taunting text message earlier. "I actually feel pity for you. You always have to pretend like you're just the garbage disposal guy every time we're here. Have you ever wondered whether she can't make your marriage public, or simply doesn't want to?" I turn off my phone and enter the bathroom. The smudged intertwined handprints on the mirror stare back at me like some declaration of war. As I walk past Renee, I don't bother asking her why she's lying to me. I don't even question why her pinned contact is someone with an aspen tree as their profile photo instead of mine. After watching a movie with her while she applies a facial beauty mask, I pull out the slippers she hid inside the safe and slide them toward her, smiling. "If you cherish him so much, then you shouldn't keep him hidden in the shadows anymore."

On the eve of the wedding, Rosalie Bloom terminates her marriage with me before announcing that Evan Lockwood is the man she's in love with. So, I marry Noelle Lockwood, who has been pursuing me relentlessly this whole time. She holds a luxurious wedding of the century for me, which shakes the city to its roots. In the fourth year after our marriage, when I find out that Noelle has suffered from an unfortunate miscarriage, I'm so worried about her that I get into a car crash. That's when I accidentally overhear her conversation with her assistant. "Hurry up and withdraw Dominic's bone marrow while he's still unconscious so that we can save Ev's life." It turns out that Noelle is actually in love with Evan, her own stepbrother, instead of me. All the happiness and love I've felt in this marriage is fake…

I've been married to my wife, Shannon Ruppert, for ten years, but we've slept in separate beds the entire time. The day our house catches fire, the flames are so intense that no one dares to approach. Still, I rush inside, knowing the ceiling could collapse at any moment. Ignoring the pain as my skin burns, I strain to lift the wardrobe pinning her down. The firefighter who rushes in tells us that, given the severity of the fire, they can only get one of us out. Without hesitation, Shannon points to Charles Rice, her first love. "I want him to live!" I feel no anger or resentment. I just ask the question I've never dared to ask. "For the past ten years, you wouldn't let me touch you. Was it because of him?" Shannon lowers her head and won't look at me. Finally, she lets out a quiet sigh. "I'm sorry. If there is a next life, I'll be a good wife to you." I smile. Only after hearing the answer from her own lips can I finally let go. If I can't win her heart in this life, I won't want it in the next. As Shannon stares at me in shock, I hold on to her and jump from the sixth-floor window, positioning myself beneath her to break her fall. When I open my eyes, I'm back on my way to college for my freshman year. Without a second thought, I use my dad's connections to transfer to a college as far away from Shannon as possible. But as I board the high-speed train to Belham University, a girl's voice suddenly rings out from outside the train. "Matthew, our story isn't over! It never will be!" I turn and look out the window. Shannon is driving a sports car alongside the speeding train.

On the day my dad gets kidnapped, I call my wife, Eliza Wood, who has a net worth of 100 million dollars, for help while sobbing. After she hears me out, she lets out a chuckle. "I've transferred three million dollars to you. This time, be a good boy and don't bother Leon." I quickly agree to Eliza's condition. After that, I transfer the money into the kidnapper's bank account. But when Dad is about to get released, Eliza pulls off some tricks to retrieve the ransom money and freeze the kidnapper's bank account. Thinking that I've tricked him, the furious kidnapper decides to kill Dad. But first, he torments Dad for three long hours before finally ending his life. When I'm on the way to pick up Dad's ashes, I notice photos of Eliza and her newly-hired assistant, Leon Turner, taking over every billboard and monitor in the city. After dealing with Dad's ashes at home, I call Eliza on the phone. "Let's get a divorce." Eliza and Leon's laughter can be heard drifting over the speaker. "This again? Leon told me that you're spending too much money, so he convinced me to give you a light punishment. Don't tell me you got mad at me because of that."

My fiancée, Gina Winston, never liked to be troubled. In the five years we had been together, I was the one who decided where we should go on all our dates. All she did was tell the driver where to take her. For every birthday and anniversary, Gina would always get me the same thing, which was a blue and black striped tie. She was the same way when it came to planning our wedding. Every time I wanted to discuss the guest list with her, she would say it was too much trouble and refused to get into the details. Even when we were taking our wedding photos, she was not happy that it took too long, and she picked the basic package. When I came to the wedding planner's office alone to confirm the wedding plans, the planner chatted with me while showing me the design sketches. "Speaking of which, we took in a client not long ago who was very particular about the wedding details. She tested more than 20 types of dessert because her husband doesn't enjoy anything sweet, and she insisted on making sure every piece of dessert had the correct sugar level." The planner smiled as she continued, "Coincidentally, she shares the same surname as your fiancée. She's also a Winston and doesn't like roses, just like your fiancée." I was about to sign the contract when I suddenly stopped. The planner did not notice anything strange about me, and smiled as she looked at the door. "Look. Ms. Winston is here again. This time, she wants to add outdoor fireworks to the program because she's worried that the groom will find it too boring indoors." I looked toward the door and saw Gina entering the office. Shock and disappointment exploded inside of me. Gina had never been afraid of trouble. She was just not willing to be troubled by me. Since her heart was not with me, maybe it was time to end our relationship.

After remarrying Odette Fairbanks, Ezra Whitlock turns into the perfect husband, one who no longer checks up on her or gets jealous. He no longer wakes up early to make her a balanced breakfast, and he no longer shows up at the hospital right on time with a home-cooked lunch for her. Even when he finds a box of ultra-thin condoms on her passenger seat, he quietly puts it away for her and pretends he hasn't seen it. Odette, however, begins to panic and starts volunteering the very explanations she's always been too proud to give.

The day the nationwide serial killer, Landis Grant, was executed, I was the one who escorted him to the death chamber. Right before the lethal injection, he turned his head and looked at me with strange, sudden pity. "You know, I only actually killed seventeen people," he whispered, his raspy voice cutting through the silent room. "I deserve to die, no question. But your hotshot lawyer wife? Her death isn't on my tab." Hearing him mention my wife, Valerie Foster, made a hot surge of rage claw up my throat. Three years ago, she was stabbed dozens of times by Landis while protecting crucial evidence. I drove through the night from out of state, only to find her body completely unrecognizable at the morgue. Grief tore through me so violently that I collapsed, coughing up blood, and spent an entire month confined to a hospital bed. For three years, I chased Landis to the absolute edge of hell, risking everything just to drag him in and avenge her. Following the address Landis had left behind, I made my way to a quiet suburban house. The second I set foot in the yard, I froze completely. Valerie was right there, wrapping her arms around her former mentor, Dylan Reed, kissing him with a tenderness that shattered my heart. A toddler, around two or three years old, was swinging back and forth on a wooden swing right beside them. My head throbbed, white noise roaring in my ears. I took a step forward, but someone grabbed my shoulder from behind. It was my chief, Noah Morgan, the man I respected more than anyone on the force. "Valerie is happy now, son," he said quietly, "Do yourself a favor and just walk away. Let it go." I shoved his hand off my shoulder. Unholstering my service weapon, I aimed into the open air and fired three warning shots. "Valerie Foster, you're under arrest for bigamy," I said, my voice dead and completely cold, "Come to the station with me."

My wife, Ruth Quarmby, had a twenty-year-old male apprentice named Craig Smith. He secretly turned off a diver’s scuba tank underwater. This caused an accident. He then posted three posts on his social media feed. The first post said, [I played a little prank underwater by shutting off my instructor’s mother-in-law’s scuba tank. Now, she’s in a coma and heading into surgery. But hey, I’m innocent!] The second post said, [Toast one: from a broke mountain kid to a certified diver. All by myself! Toast two: I confessed my love to someone I shouldn’t have, but I didn’t cross that line. Toast three: here’s to every lonely night I suffered through.] The third post said, [Best instructor ever. Without her, who else would cover for my pranks?] I told my wife to pay for the surgery to save the person quickly. But in front of the operating room door, she told me solemnly to give up on the surgery. “Your mother is old and fragile. Saving her is a waste of resources. Even if she makes it out alive, she’ll be bedridden. She’ll wish she were dead. Just let her go.” She quickly signed the Refusal of Treatment form. Then, she threw the signed form in my face. I kept quiet. The person lying in the operating room was her own mother.

The night before our engagement, my fiancée, Yvonne Gomez, died. The police said her car had crashed through a guardrail and plunged into the river. All they found was a bloodstained watch. The entire Gomez family blamed me. "If she hadn't gone out to buy you a wedding ring, none of this would've happened!" "You're a living curse! Wasn't getting your parents killed enough? Now, you've killed your fiancée too!" Ernie Young, a junior she had gone to school with, played her final voice message as he cried. "Don't die for me. Go live a good life." I held her watch and kept vigil at the funeral home for three days. On the fourth morning, I put on the white suit she liked best and went to the river alone. Then, I downed a bottle of poison. "Yvonne, I'm coming to marry you." I had just climbed over the guardrail when cheers erupted under the bridge. Ernie ran up to me, clapping and laughing so hard that tears rolled down his face. "I won! I knew he would come! Yvonne, he fell for it! He was really going to jump into the river to keep you company!" The crowd parted, and Yvonne stepped out holding a bouquet of roses. Her white dress was spotless, and it hurt to even look at her. She turned to Ernie first, her voice indulgent. "Happy now? No more games after this." Ernie put an arm around her shoulders and asked smugly, "Don't I get some credit for testing how much he loves you?" "Of course." She smiled and nodded. "You liked the wedding ring I picked out, didn't you? You can borrow it for a week." Only then did she hand me the roses. "Surprised? Ernie was just upset. He felt like you were taking me away from him, so I went along with it this one time. You don't mind, do you? You've proved you love me. Now, we can go back and get married." I finally understood everything. The accident was fake. So was the recording. It was all a prank Ernie had come up with to appease himself. And Yvonne had personally allowed him to put my life on the game board as a bet. I shook my head as a sharp pain shot through my stomach. "It's fine… There's no going back…"

A day before we were about to get married, my fiancée invited my family for a trip on a cruise ship to test my love for her. She pushed my mother off the ship when the waves were strong, and she jumped into the sea as well. I got anxious as I had no idea who to save first. My mother had swallowed a lot of water, but she pushed me away weakly while shouting, "Save Rina first! She's your fiancée!" When I finally dragged Rina to shore and returned for my mother, I found that she was no longer breathing. Rina looked at me coldly as I cried with misery, "Stop putting up that act. Your mother can't be dead. She used to be a professional swimmer when she was young. I can't believe you didn't choose to save me first. Eugene was right. You don't love me enough. "We should postpone our wedding. When you're done reflecting on what you did, bring your mother along and apologize to me. We can discuss our wedding then." With that, Rina put her arm around Eugene's, and they left. Rina had no idea that my mother had stopped swimming since she suffered a major illness several years ago. Pushing my mother off the ship had made her lose her life.

The biggest gossip in Nashford lately is that Silas Fitzroy, the town fool, is trying to divorce his wife again. When he takes Nadine Larson to court once more, she once again fails to show up. He pulls his phone, takes a deep breath, and dials her number with practised ease, never expecting her to actually answer this time. "Where are you?" "What are you trying to pull now?" Nadine demands, her voice cold. "Same trick again. How many more times are you going to make a fool of yourself?" Silas tightens his grip on the phone. "So you know I did it again. Then what about the 39 times I called you a month ago? Why didn't you answer a single one of them?"

On the day my wife, Adele Bellamy, rang the opening bell on Merrow Street to take her company public, my daughter and I sat in the audience. When my daughter was invited onstage to speak, she took the microphone and asked me in her small, childish voice, "Daddy, did you really get Mommy by being a homewrecker?" The hushed hall erupted as if a boulder had crashed into still water, and countless camera flashes swung toward my pale face. "Mr. Linwood, is what your daughter said true?" "If his own daughter said it, it has to be true! That's a juicy high-society secret. Bet he never expected his own kid to be the one to spill it." "Haven't you heard? Ms. Bellamy used to have a childhood sweetheart, and then they split up out of nowhere. Maybe he broke them up so that he could take that guy's place!" Amid the uproar, I rushed onto the stage in a panic to explain myself, but the moment I opened my mouth, Adele pressed her hand down on the back of mine. "Yes. He was the homewrecker."

My wife, Ivy Hart, is about to give birth to the baby she conceived with Toby Clayton, her first love. Her parents hire ten bodyguards to stand guard outside the delivery room. Cora Norris, Ivy's mother, takes Ivy's hand and remarks, "Don't worry, Ivy. We'll make sure he can't get within two feet of you! Your dad is standing guard outside with the bodyguards. If he dares to stop you from having the baby, we'll report him to the police!" Ivy nods, her complexion pale, but she instinctively looks toward the door anyway. She doesn't see why I can't be more understanding of her. All she wants to do is help Toby have a child to carry on his family name. The birth proceeds without me showing up to cause a scene. She smiles gladly when she sees the crying baby in the nurse's arms. She thinks to herself that if I visit her tomorrow, she is willing to forget all about our previous fights. She is even willing to let me be the baby's father. What she doesn't know is that I've already submitted my application to the Alliance of Nations. In seven days, I will be leaving the country to become a field doctor for the Frontline Medical Corp, a humanitarian organization. I won't be coming back ever again.

Ever since I catch Wren Sinclair cheating on me, every day when she comes home, I'll pin her down by the entryway, pull off her skirt, and spray high-concentration alcohol all over her private area to disinfect it. Knowing she's in the wrong, Wren always cooperates with me, her eyes red as she gently tells me to stop. But today, she comes home nearly two hours late. When I smell men's cologne on her, I lose it again, grabbing her collar. "You were only half an hour late last time, and you slept with a man. Now you're two hours late. Tell me! How many men was it this time? Four?" Wren apologizes to me for the 29th time, but when I push her away again, she finally snaps. She raises the back of her hand, still bruised from the IV, and screams, "Enough! You don't even care that I'm practically dying from this fever. How much longer are you going to keep this up? "Yes, I got drunk and slept with another man once. Do you think you're holier than me? No wonder you were dragged into an alley when you were 16, stripped naked, and abused! Theo, a paranoid, crazy man like you, deserves everything you get!" The spray bottle falls from my hand and shatters at my feet. The smell of alcohol hits me, and I can't get a word out. She looks so fed up with me, and suddenly, I feel tired. It's fine. I'm done with this relationship anyway.

I had just gotten hospitalization prior to my operation when my wife told me she was going on an urgent business trip, leaving me and our one-year-old daughter behind. Two days later, her childhood sweetheart proudly posted a family photo on social media with a caption that said: “Took a picture of our happy family of three on our trip!” I looked at my wife who was smiling tenderly in the picture and commented, “?” My wife immediately called and berated me, “He's a single father who doesn’t have a wife to help take care of his child! All I did was take a picture with them, what are you being so defensive about?” That same evening, her childhood sweetheart posted a picture of a million-dollar dowry given to him with the caption: “After we took the picture, she insisted on giving me this as a dowry.” I knew my wife gave it to him to appease him. But this time, I was going to leave her for good.

My wife, Wendy Sinclair, has a severe sleepwalking disorder. After she falls asleep, she always wanders out in a state of unconsciousness. The night before our wedding, she disappears without a word. I have no choice but to postpone our wedding. Only then does she walk out of her childhood friend's house next door, rubbing her sleepy eyes. Afraid I might overthink, she cries and apologizes to me. "There's no cure for my condition. From now on, just tie me up when I sleep, okay?" I feel sorry for her, so I just change the door lock to make sure she cannot go out. But in the middle of the night, I wake up and see her standing on the edge of the balcony. She climbs in through the window and goes into her childhood friend's house again. Soon, suggestive and intimate sounds come from inside. My blood runs cold. Her sleepwalking isn't an illness at all—it is out of love.

At my father's wake, my wife came in carrying her son. The boy was less than two years old. He was not mine. In front of me, in front of every person there to mourn my father, she opened the urn and held the boy over it. I screamed and lunged for the urn. The Vance security team was on me before I cleared the aisle. They held me on the floor. My father's ashes, mixed with the boy's urine, smeared across my face and into my mouth. I could not stop crying. Stella Vance straightened her skirt. "Zane has been crying every night. Our adviser said the ash of an honored elder will calm a child like that. Good for his health." The taste of metal came up the back of my throat. Before I could move, she was already at the door. "Have his ashes dried out by morning. Zane will need it again tomorrow night." By the time I came back to myself, she was gone. I held the rage in. I sent her one message. "You think you're going to do this to my father. You're insane. The divorce papers are coming." After that, every message I sent was blocked. I turned to the woman next to me, the woman who had stood beside me my whole life. And I said, "I will sign the company over to you. Help me bury Vance Group." Cassia Wynn looked at me a long time. "I don't want the company. I want you." I went still. Then I said, "Yes."